Discrimination is a daily reality for the LGBTQ community

On behalf of nearly two dozen LGBTQ, Jewish and social justice agencies, we were deeply disappointed in both the tone and substance of the editorial “Wedding cakes and conscience.”

While we admire the Chicago Tribune and its editorial board, the editorial concerning the Supreme Court case Masterpiece Cakeshop, Ltd. v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission was not consistent with the high bar we are accustomed to seeing from the paper.

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First, comparing a same-sex couple looking to buy a cake honoring their love to Nazis seeking to buy a swastika cake is appalling. We remind the board that an estimated 15,000 LGBTQ people were rounded up and systemically murdered by Nazis in the Holocaust. Your comparison is bullish and insensitive.

Second, the board’s dismissive approach to the indignity experienced by the plaintiffs — David Mullins and Charlie Craig — minimizes the reality LGBTQ people face in many communities every day. The board’s statement that “Mullins and Craig could have easily gotten what they wanted…[t]here are plenty of other bakers” fails to appreciate the systemic rejection LGBTQ people historically have faced.

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Nondiscrimination ordinances, like the ones in Colorado and Illinois, are often enacted to recognize that certain historically marginalized groups have faced such deep and consistent animus that specific protections are in order. Without such protections, every interaction in public commerce is fraught with the risk of experiencing the indignity of being denied service because of who you are. This risk is even greater for our LGBTQ siblings living outside major cities like Denver or Chicago.

The editorial fails to acknowledge that LGBTQ discrimination in public accommodations is so pervasive that it is currently legal in 29 states. It fails to recognize the concerns raised by Justice Elena Kagan’s line of questions in oral arguments on Tuesday that if baking a cake is protected speech, what isn’t? It doesn’t address the concern that if businesses can refuse service to LGBTQ people, are not most other protected categories — people of color, women, individuals with disabilities — at risk? It fails to acknowledge that Nazis are not a protected class under Colorado’s nondiscrimination ordinance, or any nondiscrimination ordinance, and a baker would be completely within her rights to deny service to a Nazi customer.

This case is not about a single gay couple purchasing a single wedding cake at a single bakery. It is about the integrity and sustainability of the vital fabric of civil rights protections in our country.

Comparing LGBTQ people to Nazis does not advance a thoughtful counterargument to this threat.